This scene from the life of Moses illustrates the potency of prayer

3 min read

Pray in the Spirit at all times and on every occasion. Stay alert and be persistent in your prayers for all believers everywhere. -Ephesians 6:18

Have you been on top of Intercession Hill lately? By this I simply mean have you been with God in prayer?

The concept, Intercession Hill, comes from a scene in the life of Moses. One day, as Moses was leading the children of Israel in their Exodus from Egypt, they were ambushed by an army of Amalekites. In response, Moses told his young protege, Joshua, to take some soldiers and go to the battlefield to fight them.

It is fair to ask why Moses didn’t go and fight also. Why did he delegate the job to Joshua? Was it because of his age and physical limitations?

Perhaps.

Read the story and you will find that instead of going down to the field of battle in the valley, Moses chose to fight at another level. His plan was to take a couple of guys and go up on a hill so that he could intercede for Joshua and his army while they were fighting down below.

As the story goes, as long as Moses had his hands and his staff raised in intercession, Joshua’s forces were succesful in beating back the Amalekites. But when exhaustion caused his hands to drop, the momentum would swing back to the Amalekites.

To support Moses, his assistants got on either side of him and propped him up so that he could keep his hands raised. And eventually, Joshua and his guys were victorious. The day was saved.

We All Have a Hill

As illustrated by this story, prayer is the purest form of activism. Just as it was in the days of Moses, battles are still either won or lost because of prayer. Count on it, whenever there is an amazing or improbable victory in our ongoing battle against the enemy and his associates, it is because someone has been faithfully praying.

They’ve been up on Intercession Hill, petitioning God for assistance.

While most people are focused only on action and activity, the real action is wherever the intercession is taking place…away from the noise, away from the crowd, up on the hill.

Unfortunately, many of us often fall into the trap of thinking that intercessory prayer is really not very helpful and we end up foregoing our trips up Intercession Hill. If we choose to fight back at all, we would rather do it with methods that are more obvious and seemingly more productive.

Prayer is the purest form of activism.

Meanwhile, Intercession Hill is over there just beyond the beaten path…quiet, lonely, and with too few visitors.

Oh, if we knew the power of intercession. Oh, if we understood that only prayer in the powerful name of Jesus is what will bring breakthrough.

The battle is still raging. Intercession Hill is calling. What will we do?

It’s a new day with God. Run with it.